Registry initialization and linkage interactions

[reames]

Summary

Hey C++ template/linkage experts out there, this patch is for you.

The Registry class constructs a linked list of nodes whose storage is inside static variables and nodes are added via static initializers. The trick is that those static initializers are in both the LLVM code base, and some random plugin that might get loaded in at runtime. The existing code tries to use C++ templates and their ODR rules to get a single definition of the registry for each type, but, experimentally, this doesn't quite work as designed. (Well, the entire structure doesn't. It might not actually be an ODR problem.)

Previously, when I tried moving the GCStrategy class (along with it's registry) from CodeGen to IR, I ran into a problem where asking the GCStrategyRegistry a question would return inconsistent results depending on whether you asked from CodeGen (where the static initializers still were) or Transforms. My best guess is that this is a result of either a) an order of initialization error, or b) we ended up with two copies of the registry being created. I remember at the time having convinced myself it was probably (b), but I don't have any of my notes around from that investigation any more.

See http://reviews.llvm.org/rL226311 for the original patch in question.

This patch tries to remove the possibility of (b) above. It still suffers from (a) since there are static initializers in several files within CodeGen that all modify this structure. I haven't fixed that, but hopefully, I haven't made it worse either. Once this is in, I plan to restructure code to put all of the static initializers used in the Registry in a single file to remove that possibility as well.

[• rafael]

We currently produce a linkonce_odr for
_ZN4llvm8RegistryINS_10GCStrategyEE4HeadE, so short of some linker
script this should be working (on ELF).

In any case, IMHO giving a home to these symbols is an improvement, so LGTM.

[cray]

This commit seems to have caused a build break in clang. There are now undefined references to llvm::Registry<T>::Head, and llvm::Registry<T>::Tail

Output from buildbot:

lib/libclangFrontend.a(FrontendAction.cpp.o): In function `clang::FrontendAction::CreateWrappedASTConsumer(clang::CompilerInstance&, llvm::StringRef)':
FrontendAction.cpp:(.text._ZN5clang14FrontendAction24CreateWrappedASTConsumerERNS_16CompilerInstanceEN4llvm9StringRefE+0xfc): undefined reference to `llvm::Registry<clang::PluginASTAction>::Head'
FrontendAction.cpp:(.text._ZN5clang14FrontendAction24CreateWrappedASTConsumerERNS_16CompilerInstanceEN4llvm9StringRefE+0x100): undefined reference to `llvm::Registry<clang::PluginASTAction>::Head'
lib/libclangTooling.a(JSONCompilationDatabase.cpp.o): In function `_GLOBALsub_I_JSONCompilationDatabase.cpp':
JSONCompilationDatabase.cpp:(.text.startup._GLOBALsub_I_JSONCompilationDatabase.cpp+0x0): undefined reference to `llvm::Registry<clang::tooling::CompilationDatabasePlugin>::Tail'
JSONCompilationDatabase.cpp:(.text.startup._GLOBALsub_I_JSONCompilationDatabase.cpp+0x8): undefined reference to `llvm::Registry<clang::tooling::CompilationDatabasePlugin>::Tail'
JSONCompilationDatabase.cpp:(.text.startup._GLOBALsub_I_JSONCompilationDatabase.cpp+0x4c): undefined reference to `llvm::Registry<clang::tooling::CompilationDatabasePlugin>::Tail'
JSONCompilationDatabase.cpp:(.text.startup._GLOBALsub_I_JSONCompilationDatabase.cpp+0x60): undefined reference to `llvm::Registry<clang::tooling::CompilationDatabasePlugin>::Head'
JSONCompilationDatabase.cpp:(.text.startup._GLOBALsub_I_JSONCompilationDatabase.cpp+0x68): undefined reference to `llvm::Registry<clang::tooling::CompilationDatabasePlugin>::Head'
lib/libclangTooling.a(CompilationDatabase.cpp.o): In function `clang::tooling::CompilationDatabase::loadFromDirectory(llvm::StringRef, std::string&)':
CompilationDatabase.cpp:(.text._ZN5clang7tooling19CompilationDatabase17loadFromDirectoryEN4llvm9StringRefERSs+0x1a4): undefined reference to `llvm::Registry<clang::tooling::CompilationDatabasePlugin>::Head'
CompilationDatabase.cpp:(.text._ZN5clang7tooling19CompilationDatabase17loadFromDirectoryEN4llvm9StringRefERSs+0x1a8): undefined reference to `llvm::Registry<clang::tooling::CompilationDatabasePlugin>::Head'

[llvm-commits]

This was already reverted due to those build failures.

Philip

include/llvm/Support/Registry.h

class Add {
       static std::unique_ptr<T> CtorFn() { return make_unique<V>(); }
 
     public:
       Add(const char *Name, const char *Desc)
         : Entry(Name, Desc, CtorFn), Node(Entry) {}
     };
   };
 
-  
-  // Since these are defined in a header file, plugins must be sure to export
-  // these symbols.
-  template <typename T>
-  typename Registry<T>::node *Registry<T>::Head;
-
-  template <typename T>
-  typename Registry<T>::node *Registry<T>::Tail;
+  // Use this macro to stamp out definitions for required static symbols in an
+  // appropriate source file.  This is required to avoid getting multiple
+  // definitions of the Registry's fields in different translation or linkage
+  // units.   
+#define DEFINE_REGISTRY(T)                      \
+  template <>                                    \
+  typename Registry<T>::node *Registry<T>::Head = nullptr; \
+  template <>                          \
+  typename Registry<T>::node *Registry<T>::Tail = nullptr;
 } // end namespace llvm
 
 #endif // LLVM_SUPPORT_REGISTRY_H

lib/CodeGen/GCMetadataPrinter.cpp

 //===----------------------------------------------------------------------===//
 
 #include "llvm/CodeGen/GCMetadataPrinter.h"
 using namespace llvm;
 
 GCMetadataPrinter::GCMetadataPrinter() {}
 
 GCMetadataPrinter::~GCMetadataPrinter() {}
+
+// Stamp out the registry of GCMetadataPrinter objects so that pulgins can load
+// new Strategies.  
+DEFINE_REGISTRY(GCMetadataPrinter)

lib/CodeGen/GCStrategy.cpp

 #include "llvm/CodeGen/GCStrategy.h"
 
 using namespace llvm;
 
 GCStrategy::GCStrategy()
     : UseStatepoints(false), NeededSafePoints(0), CustomReadBarriers(false),
       CustomWriteBarriers(false), CustomRoots(false), InitRoots(true),
       UsesMetadata(false) {}
+
+// Stamp out the registry of GCStrategy objects so that pulgins can load new
+// Strategies.  
+DEFINE_REGISTRY(GCStrategy)